THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION Issue 2

FRUITS OF ANTH 25320 2-3 A Tale of Two Tapas Bars: El Interna- cional and Café Ba-Ba-Reeba! at the Dawn of Small Plates Ameri- ca, el amanecer de las tapas 4 A Bowl of Nostalgia, or Discri- mination: Korean-style Chinese Food in Chicago's Koreatown 5 La Chaparrita, ANGELINA, La Dama Blanca, and César the TAquero 6-7 Chicago Hot Dog Places: A Fa- ding Art 8-9 Blood Buttons: A stockyards fashion trend revi- val 9 THE GIFT OF Raccoon 10 TABLE SCRAPS 11 Love Food in the Time of Covid-19 11-12

Illustration by Raina Wellman

EDITORIAL

Oyez, oyez! After nary a three month hiatus, the Chi- of steaming trashcans and flapping newspapers.” cago Foodcultura Clarion rings out again. This time Good existentialist that she was, to de Beauvoir, for its penultimate number, to be distributed once this seemed “refreshing after the heavy odour of more across Chicagoland in a 2700 copy print run as dollars in the big hotels and elegant restaurants, an insert in the Reader. Not that any of the authors which I found hard to take.” Years later, de Beau- or editors of issue number one ever managed to get voir (of all people!) wrote Algren that she’d even a hold of a properly inserted copy! So count yourself cook and clean for him. Imagine that! The Man lucky if you did, or could make a sandwich wrapper with the Golden Arm and The Second Sex—two out of it, as per our instructions. But now watch out books rarely mentioned in one sentence (shouldn’t for the new one in your neighborhood Reader box! they?)—appeared two years later.

For those who missed the first issue, let me explain. Such are the known unknowns, as former Secre- The Chicago Foodcultura Clarion grew out of a col- tary of State Donald Rumsfeld once so memora- laboration between the Barcelona/Miami-based pio- bly put it. But, we can have a guess as to that din- neer of food art Antoni Miralda and the University ner in the winter of 1947. In part this is so because of Chicago anthropologist Stephan Palmié. Under before Algren attained national and international the generous auspices of a Mellon Foundation grant fame as a writer (Hemingway rightly called him awarded to them by the University of Chicago’s the American Dostojevski), this grandson of a Richard and Mary Gray Center for Art and Inquiry, contrarian Swedish immigrant who converted to Miralda and Palmié taught an experimental course orthodox Judaism in New York and (much to the entitled “Foodcultura: The Art and Anthropology of chagrin of his family) took to itinerant prophecy Food and Cuisine” in the fall of 2019. Together, the soon after, earned his first spurs in the context of two of us sent our students out on ethnographic mis- the New Deal WPA Federal Writers Project. From sions into Chicago’s wonderfully variegated food its inception under the New Deal in 1935 to its worlds. A number of their projects will be presented shameful destruction by the House Committee on in this issue of the Clarion. But before editorializing Un-American Activities in 1943, the Federal Writ- about the cornucopia of Chicago food writing and imaging that awaits you in ers Project employed thousands of writers, artists, and professionals who had this issue, gentle reader, let me tell you a story. It is about romance, twentieth lost their jobs in the publishing industry. Next to Algren, who joined the FWP century intellectual history, and—you guessed it—food. But let me first thank in 1936, its Chicago office staff alone included Saul Bellow, Arna Bontemps, Hazal Çorak who alerted me to what you are about to read. Jack Conroy, Katherine Dunham, Studs Terkel, Margaret Walker, and Rich- ard Wright—a veritable who’s who of youthful Chicago artists who would On a cold February afternoon in 1947, Nelson Algren, then on the cusp of a soon be propelled to national and international renown. A major focus of their literary breakthrough, took the El to the Loop to meet Simone de Beauvoir work was the Illinois version of the 48 state guides the FWP was compiling, in the Palmer House Hilton’s Le Petit Café. On her first trip to America, de but other projects in which Algren was involved included “industrial folk- Beauvoir had encountered Algren’s long-time friend Richard Wright in New lore,” for which he interviewed barflies, gamblers, prostitutes, loan-sharks, York, and Wright and Mary Guggenheim (who made the contact) suggested drug dealers, boxers, addicts, petty criminals, and other characters in the bars, that she meet him once in Chicago. As is well known—indeed, the Reader pool halls, and brothels of “the sleaziest skid row district of Chicago” (as his carried a good story about it some years ago—it was the start of a passion- friend and FWP colleague Jack Conroy later recalled). Elements of these ate (but mostly long distance) love affair that lasted until a somewhat bitter interviews often found their way into Algren’s novels and short stories in vir- end in 1964. We also know that the evening of that February day in 1947, tually verbatim form—a poetic ethnography of the multi-ethnic, multi-racial de Beauvoir’s soon-to-be “beloved Chicago man” took her on A Walk on the underclass that had formed in cities like Chicago, the kind of “lumpen” that Wild Side through the Neon Wilderness of W. Madison Avenue (known as Algren, more so perhaps than any American author at the time, so success- Floptown since the 1920s) and to a number of serious dives: the kind that The fully strove to humanize—in their own language. But Algren also worked on Chicago School of Sociology had been studying ethnographically under the the Midwestern version of the FWP’s “America Eats” project, whose stated direction of Robert E. Park since the mid-1920s (resulting in such memorable goal was to “produce a series of regional guides describing immigration, set- ethnographic—now historical—documents on a Chicago that has ceased to tlement and customs as these factors related the universal language of food.” exist like Paul G. Cressey’s dissertation “The Taxi Dance Hall,” Paul C. P. The results, however, remained unpublished at the time. Siu’s on “The Chinese Laundry Man,” Frederick Thrasher’s The Gang, or Nels Anderson’s The Hobo). What we do not know is where and what Algren Fast forward to the 1970s. Algren whose literary fame had sadly faded by and de Beauvoir ate for dinner that evening. We can speculate on hearty then, was going through a rough patch and held a silent auction in his apart- Polish fare or the skimpy bar food that used to be offered for free to happy ment on Evergreen Street. As Chicago’s first genuine celebrity chef and friend hour drinking patrons. As de Beauvoir later recalled, afterwards they repaired to his “hovel without a bathroom or a refrigerator, alongside an alley full (Continued on p. 2) THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION

(continued from p.1) Día de los Muertos of Algren’s, Hungarian born Louis Szathmáry, recalled, he immediately spotted a typescript entitled “Am. Eats. Al- By Elizabeth Bec gren”, took a quick look at it, decided that he had to have it for his collection, and placed a winning bid (Szathmáry was a monomaniacal cook book collector whose vast library is now housed at the University of Iowa). Algren turned to him and said “Lou, are you crazy? You are bidding too much for that manuscript. The recipes in it are lousy. It was a govern- ment writers project. I did it because I needed the money.” After Szathmáry had taken a closer look, he had to agree: “I told him that some of them were easy to follow, others sketchy, and a few impossible: for instance, the Flemish booya—60 gallons, with 30 pounds of oxtail, 10 pounds of beef soup bones, 4 fat hens and half a bushel of tomatoes”. Algren laughed. “He said the book was his but the recipes HOME COOKING were not. He had collected them from various sources— By Daniel Simantob, housewives, farmers, sailors, tavern owners, greasy-spoon Maisie Watson and cooks—and wrote them down as best he could. He wished me luck in case I really wanted to do something with them.” Sophia Franzon Which Szathmáry eventually did. After having cooked and re-written most of the recipes, he published America Eats Día de los Muertos, a period of I wished to explore how spiri- in dimensions of modernity, such festivity and observance within tual connections were created as the industrialization of sugar. in the University of Iowa Press’s Iowa Szathmáry Culinary Latin America, is a reunion of the by altars. It wasn’t until my time The rise of consumerism, and Arts Series in 1992. living and the dead in service and observing that I recognized that thus poor eating habits, produce remembrance. Despite its origins I should be asking another ques- and commodify the new ofrenda. More a poetic evocation of waning rural foodlore written in pan-Roman Catholic dogma, tion as well: who was facilitating Traditional practices originating in New Deal populist style than an ethnography of the rap- in Mexico this holiday is cen- this connection with the dead? from pre-Columbian rituals are idly changing Midwestern foodways of the 1930s, America tered around the more folk and The altar makers, and precisely pushed into postmodern Chicago Eats nonetheless is a remarkable document of the diversity spiritual traditions of altar mak- the bearers of this knowledge, society, changing the nature of the of ingredients that were then about to merge into the chunky ing, the creative processes of dis- were women and young girls, ofrenda itself. The overwhelm- play and performance, and lastly, their daughters and granddaugh- ing amounts of highly-processed stew of Midwestern cookery: from Native American, French at the center of my research, the ters. These women bring about foods such as instant ramen or colonial, American homesteader, and African American ele- food offerings (ofrendas). From healing; to themselves through Cheetos reflected a sort of decay in my Cuban-American culture: and water. The Happy Meal (a ments, to contributions from Scandinavian, German, Polish, chocolate to squash (calabaza), the process of creation, and to through daily consumption that is guava paste (pasta de guayaba), symbolic trinity of Burger, Fries Russian, Belgian, Italian, Jewish, Hungarian, Serbian, Span- sculpted sugar skulls (calaveras) others who can experience what commemorated and remembered. and the most culturally signifi- and Coke) was placed in the cen- ish, Lebanese, Mexican, and Chinese immigrants. “Such a to pan de muerto, the prominence they have created from their cant sugary ofrenda of Día de los ter, as a socio-economic reality. cauldron” Algren writes, “would come to contain more Buffet and meal at Sinha Restaurant, Chicago, IL of sweets in spaces of solemnity knowledge. For my final project, I made an Muertos: the Mexican calavera, The smell, structure and material than many foods; it would be, at once, a symbol of many made me think about the para- altar of sorts, centered around the comprised of meringue powder, bounced between artificiality and doxes inherent to the festival’s In photographs and interviews, I mouth itself: the place where food sugar and water. The tongue was authenticity, the profane and the lands and a melting pot for many peoples.” America Eats At the time of writing this article, it has been Arriving at Sinha for Sunday lunch, we were historical context and symbolic delved deeper into the visuospa- meets tongue, where habit begins formed by the repetitive layering holy, death and life. also gives us glimpses into the transformation of immigrant almost one year since many of us have sat in ushered into Jorgina Pereira’s living room, in presence, specifically within tial portrayals of food to make and destruction may occur, to pro- of pasta de guayaba strips on a tastes, no doubt under the impact of the rapid industrializa- a restaurant. In the age before lockdowns, I re- her Near West Side home-restaurant. We helped Mexican-American culture. My sense of the conflict between the duce a larger exchange of life and chicken wire mesh infrastructure. tion of American food, then already under way for a consid- member hearing complaints of missing home ourselves to the cheeses and fruit laid out before research questions were tri-fold: artificial and the real. Many altars death. Thus, I entered the mouth The teeth surrounding the tongue erable time. Of the Serbians in Libertyville and elsewhere, cooked food—after 315 days of domestic con- being invited downstairs into her dining room. How does sweetness as a re- exhibited plastic fruits, conchas of a muerto, informed by my fa- were plaster blocks, covered in a Algren tells us how “the parents are used to a well-organized finement, 915 meals prepared and eaten inside Here, we sat at a long table with other groups, sponse to death complicate our made of fabric, store bought pan vorite highly-processed sweet sweet shell of sugar, merengue and well-seasoned meal, but the children prefer mostly fried my kitchen (this is a very rough, likely inaccu- with whom we shyly ended up chatting as if to traditional notion of grief and de muerto and calaveras (which rate estimate, given that I have lost the concept new faces at a friend’s dinner party. Jorgina, healing, and does this reaffirm or are inedible). It is traditionally food, sandwiches, sweets and cold soda water…sitting at the challenge Mexican stereotypes? known that one must put out as of a proper eating schedule), I predict that these owner and chef, seemed to truly encompass the same table with their children and holding in their hands During the creation of a sugary ofrendas recently prepared mole, A Pattern of Pleasure sizeable chunks of barbecued lamb, the parents look at their grievances will subside in at least two years. role of host—both greeting us and showing us ofrenda, how does one strike a tamales, sweets, the freshest American-born children in wonder and dismay, unable to to our table, but later on serving us greens half- balance between visual appeal flowers and fruits because they The story of Tio Jr., a deceased relative of the Gonzalez family, was told through the ofrendas understand an attachment to cold sodas and hot dogs eaten Exactly a year before we were exiled from way through our meal straight from the pan to and quality of composition, and are the strongest in essence and of sunflower seeds and Monster Energy drink. In his life before his death, his brother recounted restaurants and mandated to cook at home, the plate. We, similarly, occupied space some- is there a loss of intentionality/ aroma, and the souls can take that that the habit of drinking this beverage became excessive; compounded with an undiscovered together.” Clearly, even as Algren penned these lines, fast illness, this excessive consumption led to his death. Why would this drink be commemorated and food was dawning on the horizon. we embarked on an academic exploration into where between customer and guest—helping integrity if aesthetics are placed with them. Though in my inter- what exactly differentiates the restaurant expe- ourselves from the heaping platters in the cen- in the focus? Finally, how does views, many claimed that there offered in his life after death, I asked? It is about celebrating his life, not his death. The response allowed me to think about the symbol of the ofrenda holistically, as a spatiotemporal object rience from home cooking.To each of our group ter of the table, but still settling up the bill at the nature of the ofrenda itself is no difference between store- Curiously, what Algren doesn’t tell us is what his fellow undergoing cultural negotiation. They are celebrations of the life of the deceased and all that members, eating, and more specifically sharing change in post-modern Mexican- bought and handmade foods: it is Chicagoans in West Town, River North, Bronzeville, Back- the end. We wanted to explore this ambiguity, comes with that: their likings, their pleasures, their vices. It is a narrative of the deceased told a meal, was understood as a ritual act. Certain this space between the restaurant and the home, American society? more about the action of placing of-the Yards, The Delta, Bridgeport, or other working class through their consumption habits. The memories that come along with that are what remind customs, tools, and practices are shared across the public and the private. And so, we held our the bread on an altar, of honoring neighborhoods were eating. That, one would have to extract Through an ethnographic sur- the deceased life. This transition them of the personality of Tio Jr. and his story within their larger family history. Monster En- the world, but others are idiosyncratic to one own dinner; a $10 per-head six course meal ergy drink was a motif in Tio Jr’s story: a pattern of pleasure through a device of destruction. from his novels—a splendid task for an aspiring future cu- vey of Pilsen’s annual Día de of the edible to the inedible, the space. There is a certain homogeneity to din- cooked for friends out of an apartment kitchen. los Muertos Xicágo celebration, handmade to store-bought, brings linary historian. But it brings us no closer to the question ing in a restaurant that is contrasted by peculiar We cobbled together enough cutlery, crock- of what Algren and de Beauvoir might have eaten on their family traditions that one only observes when ery, and chairs for our guests and produced a first date that winter day in 1947. Perhaps it was a steaming eating in a home environment. The smallest de- total of 66 plates, each inspired by memories bowl of barszcz with uszki, or golabka studded with kiel- viation from one’s expectation at a restaurant of home-cooked meals, a feat considering the basa and other smoked meats. Perhaps a plate of chop suey may be enough to ruin a night out, but when chef-to-space ratio of the kitchen. We didn’t eat Fine Dining and Home Cooking (America Eats lists a recipe for “tin suin pai kwe” or “pork grandma serves the same four-ingredient soup with our guests, instead taking the roles of host, By Anant Matai, Richard Zhao, Michael Shen and Nancy Xue with sweet-sour sauce”) or chow mein whose slightly outré she’s made for 40 years in mismatched bowls server, chef, and bartender. turn of the twentieth century reputation had worn off by then. and cutlery, it’s somehow the best meal you’ve Through ethnographic surveys of Chicagoland res- Perhaps a couple of tamales, which, as Peter Engler demon- ever had in your life. With this in mind, we It will no doubt take time before we are com- taurants, including Susie’s Noon Hour Grill, Rice and strated in the last issue of the Clarion, had become a fixture headed to Sinha, where the home kitchen and fortably back in restaurants and before the hos- Bread, Superkhana International, and El Ideas, we ex- of Chicago’s nightlife long before 1947. Chicago’s first pizza the restaurant perfectly coalesced. pitality industry has recovered from the effects plored the notions of fine dining and home food, dis- joint had emerged on W. Taylor Street by 1924, and indeed, of this pandemic. But one day we will get back cussing questions of aesthetic, nostalgia, comfort, and when de Beauvoir returned to Chicago in May, Algren took to dining out and hosting others. And until belonging. We examined food’s relationship to both her to Little Italy for pizza and chianti. But that evening in then, we shall continue to both enjoy and en- elevation and comfort in search of concepts of “es- February, Simone and Nelson may well have simply wolfed dure the home-cooked food that we so longed sence.” Our research was strongly driven by a desire down some hot dogs—which by that time, had assumed their for previously. for understanding the essentialization of habitus into dishes or meals. Our final presentation took the form characteristic “Chicago-style” seasonings and fixings: no of a home cooked dinner where we prepared a variety ketchup, never! – before they retreated to their love nest for of dishes and their representations in order to evoke the night. the notions of culinary nostalgia we encountered in our surveys and personal experiences. Further research may help to solve that riddle, but as for me, I am now happy to turn to the contents of this issue of For this meal, we prepared vada pav, a classic street the Clarion. Falling, as this issue does, into the first days food found across the streets of Mumbai that involves of Lent, we prepared for you what 19th century Catholic sandwiching a deep fried potato fritter in a bread bun, immigrants to Chicago from Germany’s region of Suebia laced with three different chutneys, tamarind, corian- would have called a “Herrgottsb’scheisserle” (little Good der, and dry garlic-sesame. For one of our ethnogra- Lord cheater) or more properly “Maultasche” (mouth pock- phers, as an Indian who grew up outside of India, vada pav is the food that first tied him to the space of the et), the latter term designating a large, raviolo-like stuffed country itself. pasta, the former describing its function: hiding morsels of ground meat mixed with spinach between two layers of Another dish we recreated was fried rice, a street food pasta dough so God wouldn’t become aware of one’s sinful that can be found in every Chinese restaurant around culinary delight. What we have for you, in other words, is a the world. To construct our fried rice dish, we broke clandestine feast, hidden, as always, between the covers of down the components of the original recipe and exper- the Chicago Reader. This time, the ingredients are student imented with the aesthetics, forms, and contexts. Rice projects on upscaled home cooking and street food, and is the main star of the dish, a powerful ingredient be- ofrendas for the día de los muertos in Pilsen; an anthropo- cause it absorbs the flavors introduced to it. We decid- logical meditation on Korean Chinese comfort food, nostal- ed to cook the leftover rice with Maplewood bacon fat gia, and racism; an interview with the owner and cook of a because we wanted the rice to become a carrier of the fatty, salty flavor. Next, please allow us to introduce Little Village taquería that doubles as a shrine to La Santa rib-eye steak; an ingredient that is often associated Muerte; an essay by the foremost historian of the Chicago with western cuisine and luxury, we added this cut of hot dog; another one on a historic raccoon feast; yet another beef to an otherwise economical street food. Through on the “blood buttons” once produced at the Chicago Stock- this juxtaposition, we wanted the audience to reimag- yards, and still one more on our artistic director, Miralda’s ine what fried rice is and what it could taste like. role in bringing tapas to the U.S.; there is work by artists Patty Carrol, Jen Delos Reyes, Eun-ha Paek, Raina Well- As we enjoyed our meal, what struck us was the feel- man, and a fistful of table scraps concerning such matters ing of comfort in eating street food—this is one area as Shrimps de Jonghe, and the geometry common to gyros, that across cultures creates a sense of belonging, shap- döner kebab, and tacos al pastor. Who knew that they all Menu ing the space of the street into a place in our memories represent instances of the frustum! Think about this when and a place much like home. Perhaps it is the sensation you head to your favorite carved meat stall: there’s got to be Cheloh-abgoosht with Gondi of eating with our hands, or that it is fried and full of Menu flavor, or perhaps it is the shared experience of the dish a mathematical formula for such Euclidian culinary objects, (Iranian-Jewish Chicken Soup with as it is eaten by so many across the country and world. Vada Pav from the first cut to the last! But now enjoy. You have our Meatballs) and Matzo Balls. We felt that to begin the dinner with street food would absolution for indulging in the Clarion during Lent (provid- be a great start for conversation around comfort out- Akutagawa ing you can find a copy). Timpano side the home, as well as new flavors and foods newly entering the home—an elevation through both its vi- Galbitang sual representation and existence on the menu. As we By Stephan Palmié Wine and a Blackjack Hand welcomed our guests with our recreated street foods, Steak Fried Rice it began our journey to find comfort outside and eleva- tion within the home. THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION

By Heangjin Park sauce), tangsuyuk (fried pork with sweet and sour sauce), and jampong (noodles with spicy broth and seafood). The best way to label them As a Korean living in Chicago, I cook and eat is Korean-style Chinese, but the only way to Korean foods at home. To be precise, I have explain what they are is through history. learned to create a culinary version of “Korea” in my kitchen over the years. Still, there are a In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many few dishes that I cannot cook at home, often Chinese immigrated to Korea to avoid natural making me feel a terrible craving. Then, I dine disasters and wars, or find work opportunities. out. When I venture out to cure my cravings Some of them opened Chinese restaurants for and homesickness, I am doomed to have higher other Chinese migrants and travelers, as well expectations. I am doomed when I find that my for local Koreans. The Chinese restaurants in beef blood cake in broth is flakey. I am miser- Korea adapted to Korean customers, which of- able when I find my cold noodles are chewy ten resulted in the creation of new dishes. For and don’t have a hint of buckwheat. I feel lost example, jajangmyeon is a Korean adaptation when I drive an hour and a half to get a bowl of Chinese zhajiangmian, a noodle mixed with of Korean pork sausage soup, only to find that black bean sauce popular in the Shandong re- it is never close to what I imagined. I drive home homesickness. I can feel closer to the home I left gion. Over the years, the black bean sauce for the for another hour and a half, feeling the distance almost ten years ago. There are foods I think are noodles became sweeter, and onions and potatoes between Seoul and Chicago in my mouth. even better versions of the dishes I have eaten in were added. The Korean version is now com- El Internacional Bar and Marina Room. Photo credits: Peter Aaron / OTTO and South Korea. However, it can be slightly compli- pletely different from the original Shandong dish, FoodCultura Archive. Nevertheless, there are exceptions. There are plac- cated to explain when the food I crave is “Chinese.” and can only be found in South Korea and over- es where I know with certainty I can be cured of Dishes like jajangmyeon (noodles with black bean seas Korean communities. Jampong is a Chinese noodle adapted to Japanese tastes and ingredients, and later introduced to Korea through an over- seas Chinese network. Various seafood is added to Japanese champon, the main difference from the original Fujianese noodle (tangrousimian). Kore- an jampong is different from both Fujianese and Japanese versions with copious amounts of pep- per oil and gochugaru (chili pepper flakes) added. Tangsuyuk, on the other hand, is not so different from the Cantonese dish guloujuk, made of fried Ba-Ba-Reeba Bar counter. Photo credit: Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises. chopped pork with sweet and sour sauce. But the dish does not have as long of a history, as it was invented to accommodate the tastes of Englishmen in China, and later introduced to Koreans and oth- ers all over the world.

Gabino Sotelino was born in Vigo, Spain, and Jajangmyeon, jampong, and own business, mostly Chinese began cooking at the age of 14 in kitchens all tangsuyuk are undoubtedly the restaurants. In the 1960s, about Illustration by Eun-ha Paek. From “Eating Memories: Eaters of the Past, over the world before joining forces with Mel- most popular menu items in two-thirds of Korean hwagyo Present, Future - Jjajang Myun Edition,” 2012 “Chinese” restaurants in South worked in the restaurant industry. man to revitalize the legendary Pump Room. Korea. Unless it claims regional But even their restaurant busi- larger houses. Albany Park func- careers. He tried teaching his By Mike Sula Together they opened LEYE’s first fine dining specialties or authenticity, most ness was threatened with unrea- tioned as the commercial center Mexican line cooks, but they restaurant, Ambria, followed by the French bis- “Chinese” restaurants in South sonable policies such as a ban on for Korean communities after struggled to reach his standards. Korea serve Chinese dishes serving dishes with rice and strict the exodus, but many restaurants He decided to close the restaurant ideal temperature and slightly Bacalao, reconstituted, was on the menu when four whole salted cod fish on a bed of blue tro Mon Ami Gabi, before Sotelino convinced the boss to open a tapas bar. adapted to Korean preferences. price controls. eventually moved to or opened rather than selling it to others. He undercooked for a long trip. This Café Ba-Ba-Reeba! opened to innocent but curi- salt sunk in the floor. Chinese food is not only popular, in suburbs where many Koreans did not want anyone else—those level of care and attention is a ous Lincoln Park diners on December 26, 1985. but also affordable and accessible So it was no wonder many hwa- now live. Great Beijing (Dae- who did not share his cultural great virtue, especially during the But dried, salted codfish was also, oddly, dan- Bacalao is a recurring motif in Miralda’s At first Melman thought the chef said “topless in South Korea. A bowl of jajang- gyo moved to the United States bukkyeong) in Lincolnwood, one background and culinary expe- pandemic, when we cannot fully gling amid a curtain of jamon, garlic and dried work. “I’ve always been interested by the bar” (a joke both men still tell). Neither remem- myeon or jampong costs about 5 to avoid political, economic, and among the oldest Chinese restau- rience—to come in and sell un- enjoy hot Chinese food in restau- rants in Chicago, is known for authentic, poorly-made Chinese rants anymore. chilis above the bar at Chicago’s first tapas res- codfish itself,” he says. “Not only for the im- ber visiting El Internacional during the research dollars, and tangsuyuk for two social discrimination in South and development phase. Nor do they remember or three people is about 15 dol- Korea. Many hwagyo chose to its jajangmyeon. Yu’s Mandarin food, disappointing his longtime taurant. portance it has in nutrition in the world: it lars. More importantly, Chinese become chefs in Chinese restau- in Schaumberg and Chef Ping patrons. Other Korean-style Chi- Korean-style Chinese food has was on all the transatlantic voyages. This was whose idea it was to hang bacalao above the bar. restaurants are everywhere, both rants in the U.S., even those who in Rolling Meadows are popular nese restaurants face somewhat adapted to people’s tastes and “Whole smoked hams and dried salt cod hang- about survival. But also because it has an in- But Melman is open to the possibility that they in urban and rural areas. In South didn’t originally work at Chinese Korean-style Chinese restaurants similar dilemmas. The owners’ local conditions outside China, ing from rafters add a Spanish note,” accord- credible shape like a triangle. A codfish has a were inspired by it. Korea, there are about 20,000 restaurants in South Korea. Their for family gatherings. kids are pursuing more lucra- cooked by people moving across ing to the Chicago Tribune in its review of the presence, really, a holy presence.” Chinese restaurants, one for ev- visa and residency application re- tive careers rather than inheriting borders for political and econom- Sotelino and Melman had different visions for ery 2,500 Koreans. Most of them view would be expedited if they When you enter the restaurants, their businesses, which the hwa- ic reasons. For many Koreans 21st restaurant in Lettuce Entertain You Enter- offer delivery services. To be were qualified as “special techni- you are immersed in a fantasti- gyo restaurateurs have always as- and Korean-Americans, it has a prises’ mighty empire (14 years after founding It also has a pronounced olfactory presence. the restaurant. The chef wanted a rigorously au- more accurate, they almost ex- cians.” Those who did not have cal world created by food and pired to, and their kitchens are of- magical power to bring a bowl partner Rich Melman invented the salad bar at “Their smell is always a trademark!” thentic Spanish experience, and his menu pro- clusively rely on delivery. Food any cooking experiences opened decoration that evoke nostalgic ten run by migrant workers from of “Korea” where they grew up, R.J. Grunt’s). Like many of Lettuce’s concepts, totype included things like tripe, pigs feet, and is delivered hot in less than half Chinese restaurants for (white) sentiments. Photographs, callig- Central America. curing their homesickness. For it was a hugely popular novelty at the time. It For this reason, they aren’t a common pres- barnacles. Melman was sure Chicago wasn’t an hour, often with no extra de- American customers, who would raphy, lanterns, and dolls are all many hwagyo who are working ready for this: “I said ‘Gabi there’s no way we livery fee. Since Chinese food enjoy simple, easy-to-cook Chi- mobilized to represent a version These changes in the restaurants’ 10 hours a day every day, how- was also one of the very first tapas restaurants ence in Spanish tapas bars—at least in un- is such an affordable and acces- nese dishes. Those who had some of “China” for customers. You are kitchens have created quite inter- ever, it symbolizes the social in the U.S; often credited with helping to launch cooked form. Montse Guillen might have are opening up. I just don’t feel it. I’m telling sible luxury, most Koreans grow cooking experience in South Ko- served hot jasmine tea without ask- esting linguistic scenes. In Peking discrimination that forced them America’s obsession with an adapted form of neglected to mention this important piece of you we’re gonna get killed.’ up eating Chinese food once in a rea opened Chinese restaurants ing. Upon your order, you will be Mandarin, the owner’s family to move across the continents Spanish drinking food. Along with a now de- advice the evening she was summoned to the while, learning to love the greasy, for Koreans, joining Korean served a few side dishes: chopped speaks to each other in Mandarin, and marginal socioeconomic po- funct Las Vegas satellite, it had no small influ- table of two young men visiting from Chicago Changes were in order. “I’m not interested in the spicy, and sweet delicacies deliv- American communities. Their raw onions with black bean sauce, but speak to their kitchen staff sitions both in South Korea and ered to their homes. Korean-style Chinese food re- pickled yellow radish (a Korean in Spanish, as Spanish-speaking the United States. For many non- ence on the small plates trend that arose in the who said they were planning to open a tapas six people who know it’s authentic,” says Mel- man. “I said, ‘Hey, I don’t know how they dress minded Korean Americans of adaptation of Japanese pickle), and chefs and cooks now run their Korean customers, it is just deli- aughts and persisted up until the pandemic (for bar in their midwestern meat-and-potatoes Now there are quite many Korean their homes and childhood mem- cabbage kimchi (not the Chinese kitchen. They speak in Korean cious “Chinese” food cooked by better or worse). metropolis. “‘You need to have somebody in Spain but I want to get crazy.’” We changed chefs cooking these Korean-style ories, thus mediating the relation- cabbage for typical Korean kim- to their longtime Korean patrons amazing chefs, some of whom from Spain in the kitchen,’” she told them. 80% of the menu. We left the paellas and the Chinese dishes. But historically, ship between Korean Americans chi). These are a combination of and young students who come are not from the hwagyo fam- It’s likely that the majority of mid-80s cool hams and stuff that were good and then we Chinese restaurants in South Ko- and hwagyo in many American side dishes unique to Korean-style to cure their homesickness (like ily anymore. In the end, Korean- rea are run and owned by over- cities, including Chicago. Chinese restaurants. Chinese food me). Still, they speak fluent Span- style Chinese food in Chicago’s kids—bolstered by nearby DePaul University— So Guillen was surprised and flummoxed to opened it. And I had a lot of fun.” Servers wore capes. Flamenco dancers stamped and tapped seas Chinese, what Koreans call is meant to be shared; scissors, un- ish or English with non-Korean restaurants is multiple things for who lined up for hours in those early days didn’t encounter the bacalao above the bar about a hwagyo. They are ethnic Chinese Chicago proudly hosts a few usual utensils to see on restaurant clients, especially Spanish-speak- various groups of people, being think anything of the bacalao bobbing above year later when she dropped by the new Café among the tables. Chicago ate it up. who migrated to Korea in the 19th Korean-style Chinese restau- tables except in Korean restau- ing customers from the neigh- served through the connections the bar. But it’s not a common accent in Span- Ba-Ba-Reeba! on a short visit to Chicago. and 20th centuries and have lived rants. Old restaurants are located rants, make sharing noodles a little borhood. Do not get me wrong. and tension among them. ish tapas bars, where the simple act of placing a “This I remember very well,” she says. “I It’s unclear when or why the hams and bacalao in South Korea for generations. in Albany Park, where Korean bit easier and less messy. Peking Mandarin still serves above the bar were retired. It’s undoubtedly a Most came from the Shandong communities thrived between the amazing jampong and tangsuyuk, Heangjin Park is a Ph.D. Candidate in piece of bread atop a glass of wine to keep the talked with my friend: ‘Look they copied this province (like zhajiangmian). 1970s and 90s. Peking Mandarin A perfect recipe does not make better than most Chinese restau- Anthropology at the University of Chica- flies out, evolved into a galaxy of bar snacks and maybe. They’re thinking in Spain they put good thing that the restaurants that took their in- go. He has conducted research on the food The South Korean government (Aseowon) is one of the oldest great Chinese food. A chef with rants in South Korea. Their care industry and trade in China and South an enshrined, communal eating culture. codfish in the tapas bars.’” spiration from Café Ba-Ba-Reeba! and El Inter- made it almost impossible for Korean-style Chinese restaurants knowledge, techniques, and ex- for details is more noticeable Korea, exploring the relationship between nacional didn’t deploy salt fish as a decorative hwagyo to obtain South Korean in Chicago, which opened in the periences does. You can taste when you order takeout. Food is food, nationalism, and globalization. But Montse Guillen certainly thought it was Guillen and Miralda moved on to other proj- element. citizenship. They could neither early 1980s. Among Koreans the differences between Chinese carefully packed to maintain the strange. And she would know—there was cod- ects not long after that, but Café Ba-Ba-Ree- claim the citizenship of the Peo- in Chicago, Peking Mandarin is food cooked by experienced ple’s Republic of China nor go known for its spicy jampong. VIP hwagyo chefs and the one made th As for Melman, he recognizes that the dangling fish hanging at her restaurant too. ba! has endured, recently celebrating its 35 back to their hometowns, as there (Gukbinbanjeom), closed in 2016 by non-hwagyo cooks. Every bacalao was a mistake. “We fucked it up!” he Ahn, Byungil. 2015. “The Migration of Ethnic Chinese from Korea to the US and Their birthday with a $70 “Tapas Tasting Menu” were no diplomatic relations be- due to the owners’ retirement, detail in the dish—temperature, Ethnic Identity: A Case Study in Michigan” Korean Cultural Anthropology 48 (3): 3-45. Guillen was a Catalan chef of increasing renown for carryout or delivery. And just last week laughs. And El Internacional? “Maybe we did tween the two countries during was loved for its tangsuyuk. Great texture, balance between flavors, [Korean] and colors—indicates the gap Chung, Eun-Ju. 2015. “In-between the National and the Foreigner: An Analysis of the Civil in the early 80s, when she and her partner, Clar- Lettuce “temporarily closed” it’s two-year get an inspiration for what was going on there.” the Cold War. They were techni- Seas (Daeyangjang) is probably Standing of the Overseas Chinese in Korea” Korean Cultural Anthropology 48(1):119-169. ion jefe Antoni Miralda, opened El Internacio- old River North Spanish wine bar Bar Ra- After all, he didn’t get where he is today by ig- cally the citizens of the Republic the best-known Korean-style Chi- between them. Chicago’s Ko- [Korean] noring inspiration when it strikes. He offers a of China (Taiwan), with which nese restaurant among non-Kore- rean-style Chinese restaurants Eng, Monica. 2017. “A Sign From The Past: What Happened To Chicago’s Koreatown?” nal in Manhattan’s Tribeca neighborhood. Not mone, replacing it with a new outpost, Lil’ they did not have any personal an Chicagoans, obviously for its have served great Chinese dish- WBEZ July 12. Accessed Dec 24, 2020. https://www.wbez.org/stories/a-sign-from-the-past- only was it the very first tapas restaurant in the Ba-Ba-Reeba! Its longevity is emblematic quote from his unpublished memoir: “Imitators what-happened-to-chicagos-koreatown/662cbf40-4fec-4af7-937f-de5f968ef5d4 or cultural connection. As fears lollipop chicken wings, kanpong- es with hwagyo chefs in their Joo, Young-ha. 2009. Chapon. Champon. Jampong. Seoul: Sakyejul Publishing Ltd. [Ko- United States, it was an evolving two-floor art of LEYE’s overall success over the decades, blindly copy an idea. But creative people are of- of them becoming influential gi in Korean. Like the owners of kitchen. But their chefs, who rean] installation with a sidewalk mosaic of Coca-Co- with a number of carefully curated restau- ten inspired by something they see, or taste, or capitalist figures like overseas VIP, the Great Seas’ owner retired came to America and worked at Selvam, Ashok. 2018. “Great Sea, Chicago’s 31-Year-Old Chinese Chicken Wing Institu- Chinese in Southeast Asia grew, in 2016, but the restaurant (along restaurants for almost 40 years, tion, Is Moving” Eater Chicago Aug 13. Accessed Dec 24, 2020. https://chicago.eater. la cans at the entrance and an enormous replica rants that present gleaming, easy-to-swallow hear. Take an idea. Make it better. Make it your com/2018/8/13/17683760/great-sea-chinese-restaurant-lollipop-wings-albany-park-moving- hwagyo experienced political, with its chicken wing recipe) was are reaching retirement age, if new-location of Lady Liberty’s crown on the roof (featured facsimiles of particular cuisines or environ- own. Make it fit your organization and culture.” economic, and social discrimi- purchased and now run by an- not already retired. Can other Yu, Jungha. 2014. “Searching after the Root of Zhajiangmian(1) - From the Northeast Asian in a yearslong opening credit cameo on Satur- ments. These restaurants are both beloved for nation. As non-Korean citizens, other hwagyo who ran multiple people in the kitchen cook the Chinese Overseas Network” Chinese Literature 38: 281-321. [Korean] Eng, Monica. 2017. “A Sign From The Past: What Happened To Chicago’s Koreatown?” day Night Live). Inside, the Columbus Trophy their theatrics and criticized for practicing a Mike Sula is a senior writer at The Chicago Reader as the paper’s resident they were not protected or even Chinese restaurants in Michigan. same food? If so, who? WBEZ July 12. Accessed Dec 24, 2020. https://www.wbez.org/stories/a-sign-from-the-past- Bar served blue margaritas, under four large, kind of Disneyfication of culture and cuisine. food writer, as well as the senior editor for Kitchen Toke, the magazine of compensated when their land what-happened-to-chicagos-koreatown/662cbf40-4fec-4af7-937f-de5f968ef5d4 hanging bacalao, and in the Marina Room, din- culinary cannabis. His work has been published in Harper’s, the Chicago and buildings were seized by the Albany Park is no longer consid- The owner-chef of VIP restaurant Selvam, Ashok. 2018. “Great Sea, Chicago’s 31-Year-Old Chinese Chicken Wing Institu- Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, NPR’s The Salt, Plate, Eater, Dill, and government. Most companies ered Koreatown, as most Korean confided in me when he decided tion, Is Moving” Eater Chicago Aug 13. Accessed Dec 24, 2020. https://chicago.eater. ers snacked on Guillen’s patas bravas, orejas de There was, in fact, a Spaniard in the kitchen more. His story “Chicken of the Trees,” about eating city squirrels, won com/2018/8/13/17683760/great-sea-chinese-restaurant-lollipop-wings-albany-park-moving- the James Beard Foundation’s 2013 M.F.K. Fisher Distinguished Writing refused to hire them. As such, Americans moved to northern to retire: his kids are all pursu- new-location cerdo vinagreta, and bunuelos de bacalao above when Ba-Ba-Reeba! opened in 1985. Chef Award. they were forced to run their suburbs for better education and ing professional and successful THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION

By Antoni Miralda and Stephan Palmié

Angelina Méndez is the owner out as a grocery store financed and watchful culinary supervisor with the help of her mother—the of one of Chicago’s most unique pioneer tamalera on 26th street— taquerías, La Chaparrita (“the who refinanced her home to give short little lady”), situated in Little her recently immigrated daughter Village, just off 26th Street at a start as an independent culinary 2500 S. Whipple. In operation for entrepreneur. Given the role Santa the past 20 years, La Chaparrita Muerte played in Angelina’s could be described as a bastion of coming to the U.S., right from the exceptionally good Distrito Federal- start, her altar originally inhabited style tacos (no lettuce, tomato, a space behind the counter, but crema, or other nonsense, please), about 10 years ago, Angelina and expertly cooked to Angelina’s the saint decided that it was time specifications (no griddling the to offer devotees a space of public meat, ever) by the Veracruzano veneration and pious offerings. César Castillo, were it not for the Ever since then, people have been fact that La Chaparrita doubles coming to La Chaparrita both to eat as a public shrine to Mexico’s and to pray, or to leave offerings folk saint Santa Muerte (“Holy at the now prominently displayed Death”), replete with a massive shrine to “la flaquita.” Up until the altar to what devotees often time of Covid-19, Angelina hosted affectionately call “la dama blanca” a public ceremony and feast in or “la flaquita.” As Angelina told honor of Santa Muerte’s saint’s day Miralda and Palmié, it all started on November 1st every year.

But let us have Angelina tell of my mother-in-law we went get rid of my husband. I spoke to didn’t need a coyote, my moth- But, of course, Angelina is not Because none of my daughters is what I like to maintain. That’s the story in her own words— to look at a person who cured my mother, “Ma, I don’t want to er was mine. She traveled from only a devotee of La dama want to learn the preparation why, in the taqueria, there aren’t how it all started back in Mexi- witchcraft, right? The healer live with Luis. I don’t love him here from Chicago to Nogales to blanca; she is also a savvy busi- process. extras, no lettuce, no tomato, César agrees: day. Other popular items in- it and then we say whether we co City, Distrito Federal: told me, “Ask the saint. Ask the anymore, I want to be with you.” bring me. When I was crossing nesswoman who designed the no avocado, no cheese. There’s clude cabeza (head), sesos like it or don’t like it. One time, saint to help you.” Obviously, I And let me tell you, when I came, the border, I entered through the beautiful tabletops and much If I die or I don’t want to work nothing. The easiest thing is to I’ve always said that every (brain), molleja (sweetbreads), well a few times I know, some I became a devotee of Santa began to ask of her and ask of I came with my two daughters exit. As people came out, I went else in the restaurant. She also anymore, I can’t work anymore buy it and sell it to your client. worker working in any type of lengua (tongue), suadero (bone- chefs have come here to eat and Muerte when I was married to her. It didn’t change my husband and in my bag I brought Santa in. And let me tell you some- is someone with very clear or something like that, what will Right? But then what happens? work, as long as he does it with less chuck), longaniza (minced they told me that what looks the the father of my daughters, my because he was a liar. But Santa Muerte. I brought my daughters thing, instead of people pushing ideas of what a good taco estilo happen to that business? My Then there’s not going to be tacos gusto, the things come out well. meat sausage), chorizo (pork ugliest is the best to eat. first husband, in Mexico. I had Muerte gave me the strength to and Santa Muerte. And in truth, me out because I was going the DF should taste like. As she ex- daughters are going to take care in the style D.F. Because in D.F. Because there’s some people sausage), and carne asada (skirt a lot of problems with him be- get out of this cycle, out of this it was her who opened the path other way, people made their way plained, of it, but they are going to com- you don’t eat tacos with extras, who don’t. Like in a restaurant steak). We asked whether Amer- Of course, he makes fillings for cause he judged you a lot, he was toxic relationship. In these years, for me. I prayed to God, then to for me to pass. So there I prayed, pletely change everything be- nor with lettuce, tomato, cheese, if you order something from one ican customers would eat organ vegetarians, too: nopales (cac- a very jealous man. It wasn’t a my mother was already [in the Santa Muerte. I prayed, “God, if “My little saint, my little saint I’m the one who has the ideas. cause they don’t know how to do cream, or avocado. My mind has person who doesn’t like their meat. “That’s one of the things tus), hongos (mushrooms), cal- good life, was it? So, among the United States], therefore I was it’s for my benefit, please open helped me, she comes with me.” I like to stay in the store after anything. They don’t know how never been fully set, so if the cli- work, it’ll come out alright. But, I thought too,” replied César. abacita (squash). Not that very needs of wanting my husband practically alone in Mexico with the doors of the United States And so, God knows, he opened closing and I like to program to prepare, but they don’t want ent wants cream, even if it is D.F. if you order something from a “Well, the American doesn’t eat many of them visit La Chapar- to change, and, in this case, the my family. But, ultimately, my to me. If you think I’m doing the door of this blessed coun- or plan. I like to program how to learn. Then, no. Because I am style, I’m going to sell him the person who actually enjoys their food with guts or the head… rita, but César will fix a meatless son to change for my mother- mother, my main support sys- something wrong by destroy- try for me and I arrived to the to change the business. I’ve al- one of the people checking, I eat cream. I like to be authentic. work, it’ll come out differently. they don’t eat the brain. But taco, huarache, or tlacoyo ac- in-law, she and I happened upon tem, wasn’t here. So, I began to ing my marriage please do your United States. I arrived with my ways had this thing where I like a taco and say “It lacked salt,” It really does count if you enjoy that’s what I thought. There are cording to the customer’s speci- the topic that a woman had be- ask the saint for the strength to will.” I stopped praying when I friend in the bag. As I’ve said, I to stay and design mentally the and I talk to the person who is The recipes are mine, yes. César it or not. It’s like putting your those who really eat the tacos fications. witched him. It was why he leave this bad relationship. That crossed the border. My mother have a lot of faith in her. Santa changes I’m going to do. And preparing. “You know that you when he came to work for me he own seasoning into what you do. with tripe, tacos with brain, with was like that and why he acted she would help me to change my was my coyote, or the one who Muerte will not solve all of our little by little the taqueria has be- need to add more salt, you are already was a taquero, of course. You have to do the things with all of it!” We commented that he In the end it all boils down to the like that. Because of the beliefs daughters’ lives, and I decided to helped me cross the border. We issues because Santa Muerte is a come a product of my imagina- not putting the salt that I told But he was working a style on gusto and enjoyment. Because was educating them, but César crucial question: “the quickest being of light that intervenes for tion. It is my source of income, you, the portion of salt that I told the griddle. So I told him, “Look really, if you do something that saw it differently: and cheapest?” To which Cés- us with the all powerful. It is not it is the place where I feel happy, you.” Right? So, I try to take care César, here you work in my style, you like, you’ll do it right and ar’s answer is: “tacos!” Done that Santa Muerte is a god and where I am comfortable, where of these points. The taco sauces, not in the style of ‘La Chiquita,’” you’ll put your effort in it. Even It’s that us Mexicans, we have well, of course, just like at La God is another god, no. There is I do not mind working, where it these sauces, no one else makes because he worked in “La Chiq- if the ingredient is only a pinch a way of thinking where we see Chaparrita. only one God, but God has his does not disturb me. I feel happy but me. Now it’s the same. I have uita.” Everywhere, they work of salt because they’re doing it something we don’t like and we servants. here in this business. I’m very great support from César. Actu- with the griddle, regularly in all with gusto. say we don’t like it. But we try grateful to God above all for so ally, César is a man who supports the taquerías. And he accepted Since then Santa Muerte has many blessings, for so much he me, helps me, takes care of me. my way of working, right? From According to César, the two But, of course, been Angelina’s faithful pro- gives me. After arriving here He is a super worker, really. the beginning I had to correct bestselling fillings at La -Chap Angelina is not only tector and companion: with only the clothes that I was several things that are required, arrita are tripa (tripe) and carne a devotee of La dama wearing, and well, I have been I have many clients who come but now there’s no need for that al pastor (pork sliced off a ro- blanca; she is also a I think of it like this: I tell the truth very blessed. Thanks equally to from faraway places. They come anymore. And no, César loves tating cone) of which they sell to Santa Muerte. In the morn- the support of my mother, who from New York, Los Angeles, making tacos, he is making ta- up to 50 tacos each on a good savvy businesswoman ing I pray to her here inside my has always been there to pro- Las Vegas, Atlanta. Every year, cos and he is singing. He doesn’t who designed the house. I light incense every day, tect me in my decisions, right? their favorite taquera is La Chap- sing well, but with lots of senti- beautiful tabletops and when I get to the business I And in my aspirations. No, right arrita. They say, like always, ment. That’s what counts. do the same. I do the sign of the now my mother is old, she can’t “Everything is really good.” This and much else in the cross, and I light her incense. My work anymore. Menú del banquete restaurant. faith in Santa Muerte is as if she de la Ceremonia de la Santa Muerte. were like a living person. I talk to We asked her if the menu in La her like I’m talking to you, right? Chaparrita has changed over Recipiente izquierda: Pozole (carne de puerco, I say, “Mother, we’re going to the years, but she was adamant grano de maíz, chile guajillo, ajo, cebolla y sal do this and this and this and this that it hadn’t—nor would. con epazote). and this.” As if you feel the an- Plato derecha: Mole Rojo con Pollo, Frijoles swer yourself, as if we will or not. What I like to be careful with refritos, Tinga de Pollo (pechuga de pollo des- When I said to her “Comadre, in this regard is that the taste menuzada y cocinada con cebolla, tomate, sal, I’m going to change your party needs to always be the same. We aceite, chile chipotle y laurel), Tortilla de Maíz. because it’s cold.” And as when don’t change it, nor do we vary one is left with this doubt, am I it because what I want is that doing it right? It’s like an answer, people, when they come, taste no —right? When making a deci- the flavor that is closest to Mex- sion, she says, “okay.” We start to ico City. Because that’s what I speculate. Because like the way represent, D.F., tacos in the style you go to people so much in the of D.F. Therefore, this is what cold, because you will be more I try to preserve in the taste of comfortable. So it is like an affir- the tacos. The preparation of mation. That is the way I mani- the meat is always the same so fest it, right? But many people that when the client comes back, have told me that Santa Muerte they find that same flavor, right? has presented herself, that they It’s one of my concerns, the day have seen her at the foot of her that I or my mother dies, what’s bedside, at the foot of her bed. gonna happen to La Chaparrita? THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION

and symbols. In the traditional been transformed into some im- grotesque: smiling Dachshund ing hot dogs specials and other about food are clear: abundant By Bruce Kraig sense, anthropomorphized hot itations of what they once were. dogs encased in buns, ready foods that one hardly knows food based on meat, at low cost, Photos by Patty Carroll dogs and depictions of giant to eat, giant hot dogs dressed that these are windows at all. served and eaten quickly, is the food are all standard themes in Baroque as Hercules and his mate with The Chicago hot dog often is American ideal. Like all cities, Chicago is composed of neighborhoods. Mostly defined by of entertainment, with signs and where one-time children recall folklore. Here they are symbols glowing eyes. The loaded up BIG, and when the primary of- symbols meant to amuse and their family, friends, home, and of the American cornucopia. and Fantastic Chicago hot dog is itself a gro- fering is not, the operator will Bruce Kraig is Professor Emeritus in ethnicity, Chicago has been the classic example of immigration and settlement History and Humanities at Roosevelt lift the visitor from the ordinary neighborhood. By its signage Hot dog stands and carts, the tesque figure and so are the lay two in one bun for the hun- University, Chicago. He has written nu- in America. It used to be said that if you wanted to see Chicago’s ethnic mosaic, world. The styles can be graded and very existence over time, food itself, and the contexts, Utilitarian design, spare and many representations on stands. gry customer. For Americans, merous articles and books on food history travel down Halsted Street. Poles on the north side, followed by Greeks, Italians, from spare to baroque. Here, the neighborhood stand rep- represent some of them. to the point with simple decor, Some are more crudely made traditionally, more is always with special expertise in the hot dog his- becomes fanciful and then ex- tory and Chicago’s food history. Some of Jews, Czechs (called Bohemians in Chicago and later supplanted by Mexicans), again, the style is a mixture of resents just that place. It is on than others, but the idea is the better, and cheap is better yet. these are Hot Dog: A Global History, Man Chinese, Irish, Lithuanians, African Americans, Bulgarians, and Serbs and Croats, neighborhood and individual vi- these grounds that people argue Functional plodes into baroque artifice. same: hot dog stands are often Bites Dog: Hot Dog Culture in America among others. Many of these neighborhoods developed around industries large sions. If the hot dog stand repre- about the qualities of hot dog Since hot dog carts and stands places where modernity has not Visiting a Chicago hot dog stand with Patty Carroll, and The Chicago Food have class distinctions inherent penetrated. Here the old Car- is not just about eating a quick Encyclopedia (with Carol Haddix and sents its neighborhood, then of- stands, the intangibles of warm The simple stand is a box with Colleen Sen). and small that made Chicago an industrial powerhouse. Drab as factories and in them, the decor can as well. nevalesque holds sway, places snack. It is kind of anthropo- ten the decor emanates from the memory and of taste memory a cut-out window. The vendor housing might have been, grimy from industrial pollution and poverty, every That may mean not elegant de- where formal categories of our logical immersion into the core local cultural style and from the as well. For those raised on the remains inside and pushes the Patty Carroll has been known for her use neighborhood was enlivened by public art. Mostly in the form of store signs and cor but horror vacui, that is, a culture are ignored. Carnevale of Chicago’s traditional culture. of highly intense, saturated color photo- individual operator who may or local hot dogs, biting into one product out through the win- may not come from that locale. desire to decorate every pos- represents the wild side, and This was a place of ethnic work- graphs since the 1970’s. Carroll has ex- décor, this vernacular art signaled to a visitor the identity of the neighborhood evokes the past. And the ones dow. The methods of selling re- hibited internationally and has won mul- sible vacant space. The inte- that is why so many stands are ing class neighborhoods filled they were in. people remember most fondly flect differences in culture. The tiple awards including Photolucida’s “Top rior walls of many stands are not standardized, why hot dogs with petty entrepreneurs whose 50” in 2104 and 2017. Her work featured Signs, figural art, and even the usually have an antique qual- street cart stands in the open, architecture of these stands re- covered with pictures or have are “rude,” and why we think of vernacular art represented their here resulted in the book, Man Bites Dog, ity about them, often a kind of the seller hawking his product, with Bruce Kraig, a cultural history of the First things first: what is a Chicago hot dog? It is a sausage normally made of shelves and glassed in counters them as “fun.” They are. ideas about the world. Of all veal a number of influences. grunginess—antithesis to the a part of the street crowd. It is Hot Dog published in 2012 by Alta Mira finely chopped beef stuffed into a “natural” casing made from sheep’s gut. The Some are nostalgic. Others are national chains—that adds to filled with knick knacks. Usu- these ideas and myths, those Press. hot dog is heated by steaming or poaching in a hot water bath, then placed in a the oldest form of selling and ally they depict neighborhoods fanciful and celebratory, meant the physical and imagined fla- the roughest. The stand pur- Abundance top sliced bun and, when fully loaded, is adorned with a slip of mustard, chopped to remove us from this specific vors. It is this quality that cre- in times past, old commercial veyor to the contrary is shel- signs and the local sports teams. onions, sliced pickle, bright green relish, thin tomato slices, small pickled hot time and place like a carnival or ates a fellowship of hot doggery, tered from the crowd, almost If Carnevale means the gro- street fair. Some are clearly the one reason for the powerful at- Neighborhood community ex- peppers, and optionally a sprinkling of celery salt. Some hot dog stands serve an anonymous within their dark pressed in nostalgia is the main tesque in spirit, it also means older style called “Depression Dogs.” These are more plainly accoutered with work of a highly individual char- tachment of Chicagoans to their box. Shielded and permanently huge amounts of food. Street acter, still others emulate mod- hot dog stands, especially those underlying theme. It is one of mustard, onions and perhaps relish. One thing joins all stands, or rather the lack fixed, the stand owner’s status the enduring ideas that make and fast food purveyors tapped ern corporate feeding places. with which they grew up. It is in these lower reaches of the into a main American idea: of one thing: ketchup. Upon pain of banishment from the city, there is never There are other categories, but also the reason why in the past the Chicago hot dog what it is: economy is greater than that of part of the city’s cultural fabric. abundance. The quality of food ketchup on a hot dog—though chili is permitted, grudgingly. all work within circumscribed Chicagoans have been resistant the street hawker. The barrier is not necessarily what matters, forms and colors—depictions to any other kind of hot dog, between seller and customer but the amount, especially large of the hot dog in particular, food such as New York style. adds to a sense of ownership quantities of meat. Hot dog im- From the 1930s until recently, cultures and themselves pieces over time. They are typically Carnevale in general, and a red and yellow and pride of place. This begets agery is heavy on the idea of hot dogs stands were a main of art. They are the core of our not like cafeterias or diners; color scheme. What follows are art and so stands are decorated Borrowing Mikhail Bakhtin’s abundance. A statue of Paul Bu- vehicle for identifying and sig- book Man Bites Dog: Hot Dog sit-down, multiple food outlets. some of the categories of décor Entrepreneurs in bright colors and plastered definition, hot dog eateries nyan holding a gigantic hot dog nifying the nature of each neigh- Culture in America. Now just a Some stands do have a few out- and perhaps meanings of sev- with colorful banners. might represent Carnevale, alias used to stand before a hot dog borhood. The signages of these few years old, the book is sadly door tables or, more commonly, Historically, hot dog vendors eral classic hot dog places. Mardi Gras. In traditional Euro- place in Berwyn, a near Chica- stands told stories about the more of a historical document, counters, but they are not dine- do not live in the world of large Hot dog stands and carts that de- pean societies, it is a time when go suburb. Pictures of giant hot stand owners, their ideas and as gentrification and changes in in places. Form and function scale food processing and mar- liberately decorate themselves the ordered world is turned up- dogs in buns and “loaded with aspirations, visions of an exist- taste have caused a decline in come together in the practical, Neighborhood and keting. They are people who as throwbacks to another era, side down, and representative of everything” are everywhere, ing and imagined world. Smil- the numbers and variety of old folk architecture of the hot dog live at the fringe of the greater Family latching onto a familiar popular all that is rude, base, and vulgar. on and in stands. Windows of ing dachshunds set into buns, hot dog stands. stand. market, and as such an entry- sentiment. That is, they are no Many a hot dog stand expresses stands, whether in strip malls or giants holding up hot dogs, Unlike corporate fast food res- way for immigrants into the longer old neighborhood eater- this theme. The painted decor, freestanding, are routinely plas- huge Chicago-style hot dogs The architecture of the tradition- Of the décor, there are two basic taurants, Chicago food stands American economy. Travel ies, bearing naive art, but have figural and sculptural art is often tered with so many signs offer- overflowing with toppings, hot al hot dog stand is influenced by styles. One is a utilitarian eatery, mean more than just places to through the city, in the well- dogs with legs and arms dancing the kind of food served. These its signs more descriptive of the get food. Here, hot dog stands worn urban neighborhoods and marching, and hand painted are basically single-food eating food served. The other is a form are symbols of time and place, that have not been subjected menus crowded with items in establishments, stationary ver- to gentrification, and there will bright colors adorn the hot dogs sions of pushcarts or temporary be stands where they have been stands. Over a number of years, stands. Many are simply small for more than fifty years. And Patty Carroll has photographed boxes which have remained the so we see the vendors in their these stands, documents of local same or have been embellished businesses, hopeful and at the same time hopeless. Often their signs are crude expressions of those hopes set amid a fading urban life. They await the next customer, most knowing that their dreams stop here. Far from By Paige Resnick expressing the reality of hard economic facts, many exist as Before nose-to-tail was a fad embraced by guilty lic pressure. Inexpensive, versatile, and virtually in- to late-1900s. But in an era when eco-consciousness a state of liminality, a world of meat-eaters who couldn’t bear to give up the sat- destructible, hemacite was used to make a number could be considered a trend, why wouldn’t people expectation beyond this one. It isfying marbling of a good rib steak, the notion of of common household products; doorknobs, roller give up their plastic for a more earth-friendly op- is a kind of anti-modernity in a using the whole animal was a capitalist venture with skate wheels, telephone receivers, jewelry, and, tion? If we are making fabric out of mushrooms, world determined to be modern. the aim of attaining maximum profit. Now, you can perhaps most intriguingly, buttons. These small, why wouldn’t we make buttons out of the blood of find an abundance of nose-to-tail cookbooks lining dark red fasteners decorated the shirts of millions, animals already slaughtered for their meat? Iconography the shelves of Barnes and Noble; hard-bound, em- carrying the remnants of the slaughterhouse along bossed covers, complete with glossy pages, encour- on a daily basis. Department store advertisements I would argue that blood is having a comeback, and and Mythologies aging their readers to find an interested neighbor or boasted about their hemacite products, encouraging blood buttons will be the next “vintage” fashion trend three to split the cow with, as if this were a reason- customers to ditch the “plain black” variety. to see a revival. Social media has been a breeding To aficionados, the proper prep- able suggestion for the book’s target audience. This ground for the popularity of blood-based products, aration of a hot dog is a skill, showy trend is just the sequel. We have to return Despite its widespread use and enticingly creepy particularly for its Instagram-worthy shock value. and the hot dog itself is a work to the blood-soaked kill floors of Chicago’s former aura, hemacite is noticeably absent from much of The internet has been privy to high-end vampire fa- of art. So are the places from current and former writing about the stockyards. In cials, a combo of microdermabrasion and a “rejuve- which they are sold. Many hot stockyards, where the original, practical whole ani- dog joints in their design and mal butchery began. the almost 400 page Illustrated History of the Union nating” face mask of your own platelet-rich plasma, decor are forms of vernacular Stockyards (1896) by W. Joseph Grands, there is but made popular by celebrities like Kim Kardashian. art. The iconography means When rail lines began to materialize around the one mention of blood buttons on one page: “A per- More recently, you can watch the mildly horrify- more than art for art’s sake, country beginning in the mid-1800s, stockyards centage of the blood is used for blood sausage; also ing TikTok trend where teen girls spread menstrual though it may be that, as well. sprang up around them, as the transportation of live for a coloring matter for dark colored headcheese. blood on their faces for momentary internet fame There are cultural attitudes animals and butchered meat became much more effi- A portion also goes through a crystallizing process and the alleged promise of breakout-free skin. here often expressed as myths cient thanks to the newly invented refrigerated train and is used in the manufacture of buttons.” An on- cars. As Chicago became a major railroad center, it line search for “blood buttons” leaves Google ut- So it’s not crazy to think that with the right mar- also quickly became the epicenter of the meatpack- terly perplexed, spitting out results for “I <3 Blood keting and influencer support, hemacite could find ing industry, processing more meat than anywhere Donation” pins and burgundy-colored leather but- its way back into the homes of American consum- else in the world between the Civil War and the tons from specialty Etsy sellers. When I inquired ers. I can imagine a world in which DIY blood 1920s. Known as the “hog butcher for the world,” to Dominic A. Pacyga, the Chicago historian who button kits, complete with intricate silicone molds the 375-acre Union Stockyards could accommodate originally piqued my interest in these grisley fas- and individually packaged vials of blood and saw- 75,000 hogs, 21,000 cattle and 22,000 sheep at any teners, he himself seemed entirely disinterested: “It dust, make the rounds on Pinterest and Etsy, where one time, butchering 400 million livestock between seems odd to me that the offhand mention of these YouTubers film videos demoing their newfound 1865 and 1900. buttons has proven to be so interesting to people.” craft with click-bait-y titles like “I TRIED A DIY A search of “hemacite” on eBay yields one result, a BLOOD BUTTON KIT AND I REGRET EVERY- Meat wasn’t the only product to come out of the blood doorknob, dark chocolate brown with a sun- THING.” Perhaps even a spread in Vogue, the bird- Union Stockyards. Nearly every part of the animal burst design, listed for $35 (although the seller gave like shoulders of towering models draped in white was somehow used to minimize waste and maxi- me a private offer for $20 when I placed it on my dress shirts, red blood buttons popping against the mize profit. Hooves were made into glue, livers watch list, warning me in an email, “A few other crisp ivory. That’s all to say, blood buttons may re- turned into free lunch for the stockyard workers, interested buyers also received this offer—it won’t turn as a “retro” trend, restoring a forgotten remnant and intestines were used for sausage casings and last long. Hurry and take advantage right away!”). of the Union Stockyards from a profit-centered past the production of violin strings. But with an aver- to a chic future. age of 39 liters of blood in a single cow and mil- So besides this enthusiastic eBay seller, why have lions of livestock butchered every year, the Union we lost interest in this bloody, cost saving product? Stockyards had a blood problem; hemacite solved it. Hemacite swiftly lost popularity with the advent of Invented by a Dr. W H Dibble in the late 1800s, he- plastic, which was even cheaper to produce, as well macite is a material made from the blood of pigs or as being more flexible and durable. The production cattle mixed with sawdust and subjected to hydrau- of plastic completely replaced hemacite by the mid THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION

By Peter Engler By Catherine Lambrecht Impromptu Raccoon Road Kill Course from 7.5 hour In some circles, I am known as the As a gentleman at Moto took my I returned in 2006, and dinner at Moto on February raccoon lady, though truly I did not coat, I handed him a plastic bag after eating, I waited for 1, 2005 set out to earn this exalted title. holding my container of racoon. those gentlemen to con- I inquired if they might consider gregate in the kitchen. Long ago at a potluck, I sampled warming it up so everyone could It took a while because to drown the raccoon in barbeque some severely over-roasted Mr. not only do they kill, sauce. While it may taste safe and have a taste, generously offering It’s often said, with some justification, thatShrimp DeJong- and Mrs. Raccoon. I considered it clean, and cook these familiar, it would hide and not en- the staff a sample as well. If they he is an original Chicago dish. People often worry about a worthwhile check-off on my life’s raccoons, they also hance the raccoon’s flavor. objected, could they please refriger- misspelling the name. They should. It ought to be Shrimps list of unique edibles: interesting to serve the food to a very ate it until we left. He promised to DeJonghe, as you can see in a 1912 menu from the De- have tried, but if another opportu- appreciative crowd. For the picnic, I decided to cook consult with Chef Cantu and advise. Jonghe Hotel and Restaurant. It should be noted the use of nity never presented itself, so be it. the raccoon like a pot roast using a the plural shrimps was common on menus from this era. After we sat down to dinner, a Eventually several pressure cooker. I began by spend- I never gave it another thought until waiter inquired how many would of them were in the ing perhaps ten minutes trimming It seems the famous restaurant would DeJonghe almost coming upon an online query from like to try the raccoon? Ten of the kitchen for a break. I fat and a silverskin enveloping the anything. Why do we never see Lobster DeJonghe or David Hammond, a friend seeking 11 diners affirmed their interest. reminded them of their raccoon. This silverskin had the Eggs DeJonghe these days? a butcher for the trash-mining var- Of course, there was considerable gift and told them of the same slippery loose quality like one mints in his life. humor and maybe some nervous Moto dinner, and how experiences grasping a cat’s skin; tittering about what we were to eat. a sample intended for lifting away though the cat is firmly My second chance at raccoon din- a curious friend turned planted and not moving. I then pro- ing was inspired by a Chicago Tri- I assumed they would simply heat into what later became a ceeded to remove the legs in whole bune article featuring the Delafield up the raccoon and serve it un- popular item on Moto’s sections and disposed of the tail. I American Legion Post 196’s An- adorned. I never dreamed it would menu. These gentlemen seared the legs in a few tablespoons nual Coon Feed. Tom McNulty be granted the four-star presenta- showed the same astonished look as around the armpits and anus. I of vegetable oil in my large can- created the Coon Feed in 1927 to tion treatment paired with a suitable we all did that evening when their knew instantly this was destined to ning pressure cooker, then later the raise money for veterans and youth wine. What wine to serve with rac- raccoon became roadkill. share at the annual picnic of LTH- body. Once the body was seared on programs. This event, held at the coon? Moto’s talented sommelier Forum, a Chicago food chat site. I one side and beginning to sear on Post on the last Saturday of Janu- had probably never pondered this As I was leaving, they gave me an- froze it as-is with plans to deal with the other, I added at least a pound Have you ever wondered what Lionel Messi tastes like? ary, has taken place annually for question before. At the American other container of raccoon, this time the fat and glands later. of thinly sliced onions to cook until For $12.25 at Doña Torta Chilanga, you can find out. nearly a century (unfortunately it Legion, beverage pairing didn’t a half gallon. I reminded them I was softened. I returned the legs to the was cancelled in 2021). Delafield, require much thought: “Let’s grab coming back next year, though I Recalling my initial disappointing pot with a quart of veal stock, two just west of Milwaukee, is less than a beer at the bar!” Moto’s solution couldn’t guarantee this half gallon raccoon, I knew roasting or grill- cups of water, some salt and freshly According to the sandwich artists at the popular Pilsen and Gage Park torta specialists, two hours from home. Why not go? was to split a pour of Schubert Syr- of raccoon would attain the celeb- ing would be pointless. The An- ground quatre épices. I cooked the the Barcelona captain (and registered trademark) tastes strongly of chipotle salsa, with ah between the improvised course rity status of the previous quart. nual Coon Feed taught me a simple raccoon for an hour in a pressure hints of headcheese, pineapple, and hot dog. If that’s not your cup of tea, the menu’s and the skirt steak that followed. As braise is best. I knew better than cooker with a ten-pound weight. Once depressurized, the meat was tortas futboleras section lists other equally insane sandwiches named after lesser soccer fall-off-the-bone tender. The cook- stars as well as teams. Not a sports fan? The tortas rockeras, inspired by Mexican rock A gift of skinned raccoon before it was cooked. ing liquid was reduced by a third, bands, might be for you. And most definitely don’t ignore the super tortas chingonas! tested for seasoning and poured over the raccoon meat.

When Mike Sula of the Chicago Reader and family arrived, he in- quired, “Did you really bring rac- coon? I promised the kids it would be here!” Sure enough, I opened a heated insulated container to reveal the tasty creature. In the spirit of the gift that keeps on giving, many peo- ple tried it, or at least looked at it.

One cannot count on the gift of rac- coon from friends forever. Luckily, I found that freshly frozen raccoon is available at a retail store on Chica- go’s West Side. A friend tipped me off to Mario’s Butcher Shop (5817 The industrial pre-fab gyros log, a greasy fixture of fast W Madison St) selling raccoon for food joints everywhere, was popularized by Chicago’s 99 cents a pound (now $1.19). It Kronos Foods (and others) in the 1970s. It’s usually re- is frozen with its head, paws and ferred to as a gyros cone, but today’s descendants of the boney remainder of a tail. These bits fathers of geometry should be more precise in their termi- remain to assure the purchaser the nology: the solid figure created by truncating a cone with carcass is not a stray cat. The help- a plane parallel to its base is properly called a FRUSTUM. By Jen Delos Reyes ful butchers offered to remove the Meals were being served on a first- One of the most terrifying symptoms of Covid-19 is way for the sourdough craze, a process in which the sommelier correctly head at no extra charge, but I chose come first-served basis until the the loss of taste and smell. Many recover these sens- time is also essential to the slow development of predicted, “It should rock to keep the beast intact. Dinner prep meat was gone. I walked in two with the raccoon.” began with a beheading. es, but some long haulers have yet to. The fear of not the starter. There is something beautiful, tender, and hours after the event began, inquir- being able to experience a life of culinary delights hopeful when I think of all of these people feeding ing if they had any raccoon left. “Is The raccoon arrived on a has outweighed my deep fear of dying alone. In iso- their starters, creating an ideal environment for it all you want ‘coon?” a man wear- Catherine Lambrecht is a food explorer. A founder of square white plate, yel- Greater Midwest Foodways Alliance, Chicago Food- lation, I long to sit across from a date at a two-top. to thrive. This drive for so many to take on a bak- ing a raccoon emblazoned apron low stripes on the left ways Roundtable (sister organization to Culinary His- ing process rooted in care subconsciously helps to asked me.”Yes!” The guy sized me and right, plus a dashed torians of Chicago) and LTHForum.com, a Chicago Communing with friends, family, and lovers over supplant our need for relationships that has been so up and advised, “Great, the ticket line up the middle. There culinary chat site. Editor of Heirloom Recipes from the food is the simple daily ritual I miss the most in the drastically altered by isolation. Illinois State Fair, A Bicentennial Project. is half off because all we have left was rice, pasta, and beans time of Coronavirus. I crave a dinner party. I first is ‘coon, brown gravy and bread.” mounded in one quadrant and edi- Retail purchased raccoon with head and paws to assure tried to satiate this desire through a weekly online There is a special kind of independence that can only Earlier there were mashed potatoes, the purchaser it is not a stray cat. ble rice paper printed with an image cookbook club where the seven of us made the same come from making your own ketchup.I acquired sauerkraut and stuffing. For those of a raccoon in another. As I used dish and ate it together on Zoom. This activity that new kitchen skills as a result of the pandemic. I have unwilling to try raccoon, they of- my fork to extract some raccoon, I suggested next time I should I concocted ended up making me feel more alone, made my own yogurt, tortilla chips, marmalade, kim- fered ham. I noticed immediately a change in come early and help make the rac- as everyone else was partnered or with their family chi, pasta, and cheese. Things that in the past would the texture. Rather than the coarse coon dinner. They accepted my of- when we shared our meal together. have been easier to go to the grocery store for be- Unlike my first encounter, I was chunks of meat on the bone, they fer probably thinking I would never Raccoon à la Mode impressed by this raccoon dinner had deboned it and shredded it came simpler to attempt to make, rather than brave a follow through. 9 lb Raccoon (frozen with head, paw, and tail will net about 4 pounds after The majority of recipes serve two to four, mirroring trip through the potential perils of the market. I have at first sight. It was juicy like a pot more finely, yet the taste was very preparation) roast. Raccoon is a boney rascal, so much the same. Only then did I see the expected domestic configurations of a partner experienced a kind of food sovereignty, and while The next year in January, I drove up White vinegar (to rinse) one must gnaw, chew and suck to the larger picture: the presentation and children. To avoid this reality, a single person this small victory tastes sweet, nothing compares to three weeks in advance of the din- 1 tablespoon Quatre-Épices (or ground allspice) get every wee bit, leaving a plate was of a roadkill raccoon, with the would have to convert fractions to rescale the recipe the flavor of food shared with loved ones. ner to help clean the raccoons. They of bones honoring all the cooks’ ef- animal’s guts splattered across the 2 teaspoons salt A two-dimensional representation of an inverted conical or acquire a specialty cookbook with recipes “for were supposed to begin at 9 AM, forts. pavement! 1 1/2 lb onions, halved lengthwise, then thinly sliced into half moons (6 cups) frustum (Super Grill & Sub, once at 2247 E 71st St). one.” Instead of making this depressing pivot, I con- The one year anniversary of the first reported case and I arrived at 10 AM just in time tinued to cook the things I love in the scales they of Covid-19 in the US was January 21, 2021. That to watch them close up shop. I for- 6 large garlic cloves, finely chopped After dinner was over, I was di- A few months later there was an ar- were intended. I made Montréal-style bagels by the date was also the inauguration of President Biden got the Senior Citizen Factor: they 1 quart chicken stock (or water) rected to the gentlemen who pre- ticle about Moto in Time magazine dozen, pans of lasagna, cauldrons of stock. While I and Vice President Harris, the beginning of a new pared the dinner. I naturally asked always arrive early and leave early. 2 cups water of April 4, 2005 which began: CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION 2. Chicago, February, 2021 couldn’t share these delights gathered around a ta- era, and the official start of the second year of the Hammond’s question, “Where can Initial preparation of the raccoon is essential: Remove and dispose of the head, paws, ble, I prepared to-go meals for friends and neighbors pandemic. I have made 36 more cookies since the The day before the Coon Feed, I re- Editor in Chief: Stephan Palmié you find someone to butcher a rac- When a recent guest at the chic Chi- and tail. turned to help chop vegetables and Creative Director: Antoni Miralda and continued to nourish my relationships through time I began writing this piece. I do not know how coon?” They gave me a polite but cago restaurant Moto brought in a assemble the stew. I arrived before If the membrane is still present after skinning, remove as much membrane enveloping Senior Editors: Eric May and Peter Engler food while apart. many more pizzas I will eat alone before the pan- quizzical look. “Young lady, all of Tupperware bowl of warm raccoon the raccoon as possible with a sharp knife or razer blade. This membrane has the same Paige Resnick they did by an hour. I did the least Managing Editor: demic is over, how what new skills I will learn in the us are hunters. We carefully field meat and asked chef Homaro Cantu slippery loose quality like one experiences grasping a cat’s skin. Editorial Assistant: Sam Herrera favored tasks of chopping apples Time has become an endless blur; while confined kitchen, or if I will need to purchase a cake shield to dressed the raccoons, then later cut to “do something special with it,” Graphic Designers: Salvador Saura, Ramon Torrente and onions, completed before their Aggressively trim fat and scent glands on the front and rear legs, as well as along to our homes many of the previous markers of our place over my 40th birthday cake this year. What I them up.” the master chef did not flinch. Em- and Pau Torrente arrival. I then prepped carrots and the spine. These glands are marble or pea-sized with streaks of fat and will adversely schedules and days have evaporated. But when do know is that there are many risks I am willing to ploying one of his latest innova- flavor the meat. BIOS celery, some chopped to cook with there is a holiday or life milestone, our sense of time take for love, but dating during the pandemic is not I then recounted my first dreadful tions, he turned on his Canon inkjet Peter Engler worked at the University of Chicago carrying out basic research in the raccoon and others sliced into Preheat oven to 375ºF. mammalian genetics. A South Side resident for over forty years, he took an interest in re-enters in high relief, like a memory triggered by one of them. raccoon experience, and told them printer and, using meat-flavored the often-overlooked cuisine of the area. He has written and lectured on topics such as sticks for a relish tray. scent, amplified by the foods we associate with their raccoon was a completely inks, printed out an illustration of Portion the meat into legs, rib cage, and spine. Rinse in vinegar, pat dry, then apply soul food, barbecue, and bean pie, as well local oddities such as the jim shoe, big baby, seasonings of salt and Quatre-Épices. and mother in law. those moments in time. Holiday birds, pies of different and flavorful experience. a raccoon on edible starch paper. Once the brined raccoon meat, Eric May is a Chicagoland-based parent, chef, and recovering artist. Eric is the the season, the unending ways we remember They beamed with pride at my He stewed the meat with juniper, In a Dutch oven, add half the onions and garlic, then arrange raccoon pieces on top founder and director of Roots & Culture, a nonprofit visual arts center in Chicago’s apples, celery, carrots, and onions compliments. These fine and fit placed the paper on top and dubbed and add remaining onions and garlic. Add the stock and water, then bring to a boil. Noble Square neighborhood. how to eat Chex Mix in overflowing bowls of were laid out in deep restaurant gentlemen, obviously veterans of the tasty entrée “road kill,” much Place Dutch oven in preheated oven. After one hour, turn the raccoon, then continue Miralda is a multidisciplinary artist who has lived and worked in Paris, New York, party mix or dressed in peanut butter, choco- pans, the kitchen manager added cooking another 60-90 minutes until the meat is very tender, similar to a pot roast. Miami, and Barcelona, his hometown, since the 1960s. His work has evolved around World War II, cooked 60 raccoons to the delight of his guest, an avid food culture, obsessive objects, ceremonials, public art, and community events. In the late, and powdered sugar, masquerading as pepper and pickling spices. Each for this event. hunter. All in an evening’s work at Return Dutch oven to the stovetop. Over medium-high heat, reduce cooking liquid to year 2000, he created the Food Pavilion for the World Expo held in Hannover, “puppy chow,” blackeyed peas to bring pros- pan was then wrapped in foil. Water Germany, and subsequently the FoodCultura Museum, in connection with the Sabores Moto, where customers are start- two cups. Adjust seasonings and then pour over the raccoon. perity in the New Year, life milestones sealed to braise would be added on Satur- y Lenguas/Tastes & Tongues and Power Food project. As I was leaving, one of the hunter- ing to catch on that whimsy is the Alternatively, cook in a pressure cooker Stephan Palmié is a native Bavarian with a Huguenot (French Calvinist) name and with a cake. day morning, then the pan popped cooks kindly presented me with a chef’s specialty. “We’re dinner and with a 10-lb weight for an hour. a German accent that he can’t seem to shake, but likes to think of as close to what the quart of raccoon meat to enjoy later. into the oven for a long, slow cook. German-born founder of American Anthropology, Franz Boas, might have sounded a movie, all wrapped up in one,” Quatre-Épices like. He is the Norman and Edna Freehling Professor of Anthropology at the We mark the passage of time in food. 60 ba- Cantu says. University of Chicago, works on Afro-Cuban ritual traditions, is the author and editor gels. 24 pizzas. Two lasagnas. Five cakes. 72 Once my association with raccoon 2 tablespoons white peppercorns of a bunch of books, and likes to think with food, preferably stews. A few days later, I went to a din- jars of preserves.180 cookies.This is a sam- became well known from a Chi- (you can also use black) Paige Resnick is a nonfiction writer, an amateur yet confident cook, and a very good ner at Moto, Homaro Cantu’s early Throughout the next year I often cago Tribune article, life got even 1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg eater. She grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, lives in Chicago, Illinois, and has a strong pling of the output from my kitchen during temple of molecular gastronomy in wondered how those wonderful Midwestern accent. She writes about food, culture, and her perplexing childhood. the pandemic. I joked with a friend that I now more interesting. A friend met with 1/2 teaspoon (about 12) whole cloves Chicago, carrying the raccoon in a gentlemen who hunted and cooked Raina Wellman is an artist and designer from Santa Fe, New Mexico. She is me in a parking lot, and upon open- passionate about supporting projects about health, food, collaboration, and community. tell time in pizza; my weekly homemade piz- deli container for David Hammond the raccoons would react to learn- 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon ing his trunk,he revealed a gift of za night is the only clearly demarcated day in to taste. Since he had spent consid- ing what had become of their gift of 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger All of the lettering in the Chicago FoodCultura Clarion Issue 2 has been hand-painted a freshly killed raccoon, so fresh by Chuck Willmarth of Southwest Signs. my week. Comedy points to truth, my pizza erable time trying to locate a rac- raccoon meat. I could have called that rigor mortis hadn’t yet set in. A few pieces of allspice clock is real. For some, their food clocks coon butcher, I felt he should have them up or written a letter, but I Support for The Chicago FoodCultura Clarion is provided Having learned long ago that more might be made of banana bread—fittingly a sample of what he had so long waited until the next Coon Feed to through a Mellon Collaborative Fellowship in Arts Practice and opportunities arise from saying yes Grind in a coffee grinder until even. Raccoon plate from the Delafield Scholarship at the Richard and Mary L. Gray Center for Arts and banana bread was the first of the pandemic desired. If he didn’t like it, then he update them on how their gift kept American Legion Post Annual Coon Inquiry at the University of Chicago. than no, I took it. I was advised to In a pinch, substitute allspice. food trends, itself brought on by the rot and could cease his efforts. on giving. Feed trim off the fat and scent glands the effects of time. This gateway loaf made THE CHICAGO FOODCULTURA CLARION

the Passage of Time By Jen Delos Reyes The Preparation of Meals,

and proponent that our institutions can become tender and vulnerable. Delos Reyes currently lives and works in Chicago, IL where she is the Associate Director where she is the and proponent that our institutions can become tender vulnerable. Delos Reyes currently lives works in Chicago, IL Art History at the University of Illinois Chicago. Art & of the School Jen Delos Reyes is a creative laborer, educator, radical community arts organizer, and author of countless emails. Defiantly optimistic, friend to all birds, radical community arts organizer, educator, Jen Delos Reyes is a creative laborer,